MANILA — The Philippine government is "confident" that it would achieve in the first week of 2022 its COVID-19 vaccination target for last year, an official said on Monday.

Authorities had eyed fully inoculating 54 million people by the end of 2021. As of Jan. 2, some 49.8 million of the Philippines' 109 million people were fully vaccinated, according to data from the health department.

"Tinutulak natin ngayon at kampante tayo na iyong 54 million maaabot natin ngayong first week of January," said National Task Force Against COVID-19 deputy chief implementer Vince Dizon.

(We are pushing and we are confident that we will reach the 54 million target this first week of January.)

"Alam naman natin iyong hirap na dinaanan natin sa iba’t ibang rehiyon, lalo na sa Region 7, sa Region 8 at ibang parte ng Mindanao dahil sa bagyong Odette, so kailangan habulin natin iyan," he said in a televised public briefing.

(We know the difficulty that various regions went through, especially Region 7 and 8, and some parts of Mindanao, because of typhoon Odette, so we need to cope with that.)

Odette struck in mid-December, and was the strongest typhoon to hit the country last year. It left hundreds dead, damaged about half a million homes, and prompted government to declare a state of calamity over 6 regions.

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Carlito Galvez, the country's vaccination chief, noted on Sunday that wealthy nations cornered the bulk of the limited vaccine supply during the early months of 2021.

"When we rolled out our National Vaccination Program in March, we could only manage to administer less than 800,000 jabs. Also during that time, we were only receiving less than a million doses monthly," he said in a statement.

"But as our country started to get a steady supply of bigger vaccine shipments, our vaccination throughput also exponentially increased. We are now capable of vaccinating 1 to 2 million Filipinos daily, and receiving around 2 million COVID-19 vaccines every day," continued the official.

Galvez also noted that Metro Manila has vaccinated 100 percent of its target population.

Authorities will prioritize administering booster shots for the elderly and people with comorbidity, as well as ramping up the vaccination of minors, said Dizon.

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"Hopefully pati iyong 5 to 11 [years old], pagkakuha natin ng supply natin galing sa Pfizer ngayong buwan ng January, e masimulan na rin natin," he said. "Iyan ang pina-follow up namin ngayon sa ating mga supplier."

(Hopefully, we can also start with the 5 to 11-year-olds once we get the vaccine supply from Pfizer this January. That's what we are following up with our suppliers.)

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